Better Days
by Accusation
Summary: A series of unrelated ficlets that are too short to post on their own. Updated every once in a while. June 25 2007 updated, wtf?
1. Seasonal Lag

_I wish it was Summer right now. That's why I wrote this. Also, I think Osaka would rock at the 'guessing' game, but I don't think she'd come up with the concept on her own. Characterization is a problem for me, so I hope I did okay._

_--_

**Seasonal Lag**

It's an unbearable summer afternoon. The sun beats down on three girls, making them wilt and lean against each other as they sit on a park bench. Osaka might actually be sleeping, but the others can't tell, and they're far too exhausted to move or otherwise attempt to grab her attention. Tomo is sucking down a soda, her third since the three girls met up earlier that day, but not even mass amounts of sugar can rouse the girl from her stupor. It's just too hot to move right now.

"To-o-o-mo." Yomi's voice is decisively whiney. "Can I have a sip? I'm thirsty."

"Nuh-uh," Tomo replies dully. "Should've bought one for yourself."

"You're such a pig," Yomi says without any real conviction. "I'm supposed to be your best friend. What if we were lost in the desert and that was our only water source, huh?"

"You're rambling." Tomo nods to the building by the edge of the park, where bottled water and soda are sold. "And we're not lost in the desert… We're sitting in the park."

"I know, but… I can't… move." Yomi sighs, closing her eyes against the sun.

Tomo heaves a sigh and nudges the soda toward her friend with one finger. "Fine… whatever."

After that, the minutes roll on silently. Yomi starts to drift off to sleep as well, her head drooping until it rests on Osaka's shoulder. Only Tomo keeps her eyes open, staring boredly at the nearest tree. Still, despite the heat, she _has_ just chugged down three sodas, and she can feel the sugar tingling at her fingertips. It's not enough to make her jump up and move, as it usually would, but it makes her want to _talk_, at least.

"Hey, check out that old lady over there," she says, nudging Yomi, who grunts. "I wonder what she's doing?"

Yomi cracks open one eye. "She's just standing there."

"Yeah, but what for? Do you think she's lost?"

"What do _you_ care?" Despite herself, Yomi opens her other eye.

"Oh, I dunno. Haven't you ever just wondered about people?" Tomo asks cheerfully.

"Sometimes I wonder about you a _lot_," Yomi grumbles.

Tomo stretches, still staring down the path, where an elderly woman is standing by herself, half bent over as if she's not entirely sure of her balance. "Sometimes I play this game," she says. "It's where you look at someone and try to guess stuff about their lives. You can do it while you're out shopping and it really helps to liven up a dull experience."

Yomi sighs, rubbing her temples. "You call it a game… I call it stalking."

"It is not stalking!" Tomo says indignantly, or as indignantly as she can manage. She grins. "It's just something to do for fun! Just guessing."

Osaka stirs from beside the two friends, her eyes opening blearily against the sun. It seems she's been awake all along. "Ya mean, make stuff up?"

This statement causes Tomo's grin to fade, if only slightly. "Well… yeah, basically."

"So if I said that lady's waitin' for someone important, it would be part of the game?"

"Mmhm. You got it," Tomo enthuses, giving her friend the thumbs up.

"Oh. Well, then, who's she waitin' for?" Osaka asks.

Tomo sits up a little straighter. "That's the part you're supposed to guess. But first of all, who _is_ this old woman?"

"She looks like a Mayako to me," Yomi says dryly, not exactly playing along, but a little curious as to what her crazy friends will come up with.

"Oh! Good one, Yomi!" Tomo exclaims. "I bet she grew up in this area, but she hasn't been back in a long time. Yeah…" Tomo rubs her chin, that famous, diabolical grin creeping onto her face. "See, she traveled a lot in her youth, never staying in one place too long. It reminded her…"

"Of a lost love," Osaka supplies with a nod.

"Nice, Osaka! Now you get it! So, did he leave her at the altar?" Tomo asks.

"Nah." Osaka smiles in a way that is both infectious and a little creepy. "He died. It was a boating accident, a week before the wedding was to take place. Afterwards, Mayako ran off without tellin' anyone. She was just heartbroken."

"Yeah, she does look kind of sad," Tomo muses, leaning back with her hands locked behind her head. "Her whole family assumed that she drowned with her fiancé… But really, she was traveling all over the globe, trying to forget the tragic death of her one true love!"

"Okay, now you guys are taking it a little too far," Yomi says, not sure if she should laugh or scold them. "I mean, it's just an old lady in the park. Really, now."

"Eventually, she remarried," Tomo continues, ignoring Yomi, as usual. "And she never told anyone about her tragic past."

"Yep. And she's just waitin'," Osaka says softly. "Waitin' for the ghost of her one true love to appear before her and say—"

Even Tomo has to make a face at that one. "Osaka, that's lame! I'm embarrassed, and it didn't even come from me."

Yomi can't help but smirk. "Gee, Tomo, now you know how I feel every time you open your mouth."

"Oh, hush up, four-eyes," Tomo says dismissively.

"If it wasn't so damn hot, I'd be beating you. _Badly._"

Osaka smiles, leans back, and asks, "Does this mean the game's over?"

"Yeah, the game's over," Tomo grumbles, rising to her feet and fanning herself with one hand. "I'm going to get another drink. Any takers?"

"Me," Yomi says, handing over some change.

Osaka watches as the old woman begins to walk slowly and deliberatively down the path, her back to the girls, becoming smaller with each step. She sighs in what could either be disappointment or contentment. "Me," she says, ten seconds late.

--


	2. Grade A Denial

_Just to make things clear, I don't think that Tomo acts like she does to cover up some kind of deep inner pain _XD _But at the same time, I find it hard to believe she just coasted through high school and was never reprimanded or anything (except for that scene at the beginning of 'Exams')._

_--_

**Grade A Denial**

Yomi walked through the hall, a little unnerved by the silence. It was funny how different the school looked without dozens of students mingling in the halls, their voices forming a comforting background noise and their bodies a tide that would carry her from class to class. Now, nearly everybody was gone for the day—and the students who belonged to a club were holed up in the gymnasium or computer lab. The building seemed empty and strange.

She'd made it more than halfway home before suddenly realizing that she had left her English textbook at school. After debating with herself for several minutes, she turned on her heel and, frowning, made her way back toward the school. If she had been with the others, she might not have gone back—_probably_ wouldn't have gone back. But the rest of her friends had already turned onto the side streets that lead them home, and Tomo, who lived closest to Yomi, had disappeared at the final bell. So she walked back to school.

As she neared the classroom, she could hear a woman's voice from inside, and cringed as she realized that it was Miss Yukari. She had been planning to duck inside, grab the textbook, and leave, not get dragged into some inane conversation with her homeroom teacher. Yomi was about to pass by without entering—not even English homework was worth that—when her own name made her freeze.

"…but this is your future we're talking about, here. I certainly hope you aren't expecting to follow Miss Mizuhara around for the rest of your life, copying her work."

There was a pause. Then, almost sullenly, a girl's voice answered: "No."

"Well, good. I'm glad to hear that. You know, you're not a stupid girl, Tomo. You just need to take some initiative." Miss Yukari sounded bored, as if she'd repeated this speech more than once before, and was tired by now of trying to motivate lazy students.

"I do study, sometimes!"

Yomi glanced around, biting her lip. If the situation had been reversed, she was sure… but that wasn't her style, exactly. She wanted to keep Tomo from getting too full of herself, not make her feel _bad_.

Miss Yukari's chair scraped against the floor, and Yomi started, taking a few steps backward, but the classroom door remained shut. Instead, Miss Yukari said, "Sometimes just isn't enough. Look, to be honest with you, I didn't know what I was going to do with my life when I was in high school. All I had going for me was an aptitude for foreign language. I guess I became a teacher because Nyamo did." Another pause, and Tomo said something she couldn't quite make out. "You just have to take whatever you're good at and use it," Yukari continued, and though Yomi couldn't see her, she imagined the teacher waving one hand dismissively. High school problems didn't matter anymore once you'd graduated.

"…good at anything," Tomo replied after a minute, in a much lower voice than she usually used. "Even Kagura has sports."

"Well," Miss Yukari replied, sounding as if she'd moved closer to the door, "maybe you should use some of that extra energy finding out where your talents lie. But, listen, you're still young, you know? Just concentrate on studying right now, and take things from there."

Miss Yukari did exit the room then, but she turned in the opposite direction and skipped down the hall with her back to Yomi, humming cheerfully. Yomi paused, unsure of what to do. Tomo was still in the classroom, and she didn't want to make it obvious that she'd been eavesdropping. But then again, what if Tomo was really upset? She didn't act like she cared about school, or anything for that matter, but…

So she walked over and slid open the classroom door before she could talk herself out of it. She didn't know what she'd been expecting—Tomo in tears, maybe? Tomo angry?—but it certainly wasn't the lazy grin that the other girl gave her when she entered the room.

"Oh, hey, Yomi! What are you doing here?" Tomo asked cheerfully. She was standing next to her desk with one hand resting lightly on top, as if she, too, had forgotten a text book and was about to root around inside her desk for it.

"Uh… I forgot my English textbook," Yomi said uncertainly. "What are _you_ doing here?"

"I had a meeting with Miss Yukari." The cheerful honesty of this statement surprised Yomi. Being lectured by a teacher wasn't something to brag about, even for Tomo.

"Oh?"

"Yeah, it was some class rep thing. Pretty boring." Tomo looked around the room, then shrugged. "Chiyo-chan felt sick, so she didn't stay."

"…Oh."

Tomo raised her eyebrows and gestured to Yomi's desk. "Um, are you just gonna stand here all day? Let's get moving!"

"Yeah. Sorry." Yomi moved to the back of the room and pulled the textbook out of her desk, letting it slide neatly into her bag. She clicked the latches shut and straightened herself, then followed Tomo from the room. She realized as they walked down the empty hall that Tomo was humming.

She didn't even want to know what went on in other people's heads sometimes.

--


	3. Child of Wisdom

_Ah, Chiyo-chan. She seems to have everything handed to her, but, she's still a little kid who attends high school. My own sister is ten, and even if she were as smart as Chiyo, I wouldn't want her going to high school. Anyway, I wrote this thinking about that episode where Tomo is teasing her and she takes her hair out of the pigtails._

**Child of Wisdom**

Today is the day Chiyo Mihama will let her hair down.

It just feels right. After all, she isn't just a child anymore. She's a high school student. If she acts like a high school student, shouldn't she look like one, too? Pigtails are cute, but they just don't radiate maturity. It shouldn't be such a big, big thing to wake up in the morning and brush your hair and then just leave it as it is. After all, people change their hairstyles all the time. All the time.

Chiyo slides out of bed so early in the morning her mother and father are still asleep, and she pads across her large, uncluttered bedroom. Mr. Tadakichi knows this routine by heart, in the way that only a dog can. He won't whine to be let outside until Chiyo has finished doing her hair in the bathroom and woken up her parents.

With each step she takes, the thought dances across her mind. _Today's the day! Today's the day!_

Chiyo stares at herself in the bathroom mirror, looking for signs of adulthood. Or at least _young_ adulthood, which her friends have already embraced. Even Osaka—she doesn't have much of a figure, but you can tell she's in high school, at least. It's something in the face. Chiyo searches her own body for a difference—the slope of her cheeks, the hollow of her throat—and knows with a mixture of relief and disappointment that she is still an eleven-year-old today.

Honestly, she's not sure whether she wants to grow up or not. It all seems like such a bittersweet hassle—Tomo worrying over her bust size, Yomi trying every new diet that comes around, Sakaki growing so tall that everyone stares… As much as she dreads those days of finding things about herself that she hates, Chiyo wants to walk into the classroom and have something in common with all the other girls. Anything.

Chiyo brushes her hair and then models for Mr. Tadakichi, smiling and saying, "Oh, it was just time for a change, that's all." She flips her hair over her shoulder, enjoying how free it feels, just falling around her face, not trapped up in pigtails. Not today.

She can just imagine what the others will say. Yomi will smile indulgently at little Chiyo, much like a mother smiles when her child does something "grown up" just for the sake of doing it. Sakaki won't understand anything but Chiyo's need to break away. Osaka will either be ecstatic or horrified. Kagura will laugh, not meanly, but she'll laugh all the same. And Tomo… Tomo will tease her, and that's the worst, the one thing she can't deal with like a grown up.

All day long, other girls, Kaorin and Chihiro and the rest, they'll ask Chiyo why she's not wearing her hair in pigtails anymore. _It was so cute,_ they'll sigh. Exactly. Exactly. It was so cute, and Chiyo is more than just cute. More than just a mascot, more than just a child.

Chiyo stares at herself in the mirror and feels that confidence slip away. Just a twinge of doubt, but it's there all the same. She wonders if today is really the best day to stop wearing pigtails. The best day might be, in fact, tomorrow. Or, actually, the best time to do it might be right at the start of school after Spring break. In fact, she could start wearing her hair down _during_ Spring break and just continue once school starts up again. That way, it won't be so sudden. There will be less of a fuss made over her. Yes, planning ahead is good. Spontaneity can cause problems, unforeseen annoyances.

Chiyo puts her hair up in pigtails again today, and every day. But she's counting on Spring break.

--


	4. Orange Friday

_All I can say about this one is: personal experience. It was disgusting. Why, yes, I am totally immature._

_--_

**Orange Friday**

It was P.E. The class was split into several groups that period—Miss Kurosawa was giving a large group of girls pointers on their volleyball serve, several students were racing on the track, and Osaka and Tomo were standing off to one side, looking down excitedly at something Osaka held in her outstretched hands.

Kagura, just finished with her race, jogged over to the two girls. "What's going on?"

"Oh, hey, Kagura," Tomo said. "We're just looking at this thing Osaka bought yesterday."

"It was one hundred yen," Osaka said in a cheerful zombie voice, holding her hands out to Kagura.

It was a blue rubber ball, about the size of a baseball. Kagura stared at it, raised her eyebrows, slowly looked up at Osaka. "You spent money on that?"

"It was one hundred yen," Osaka repeated.

"But _wait_," Tomo interjected. "Look what it does! Show her, Osaka!"

Obediently, Osaka clenched her hands into fists. The ball squished into a blob shape and the color changed to a bright red. Osaka opened and closed her fists several times to demonstrate the changing color, then looked expectantly up at Kagura. Tomo followed suit. Kagura kicked at the ground with one foot. Okay, so it was really dumb and immature, but… she kind of wanted to try it herself.

"Can I see?"

Osaka handed over the ball, and Kagura tossed it into the air, trying not to look too childish.

"This isn't baseball!" Tomo shrieked in her ear. "This is science!"

"Calm down!" Kagura snapped, resisting the urge to hurl the ball at Tomo's head. "What do you mean, science?"

"We're tryin' to figure out if that's liquid in there," Osaka said. "Or if it's just another ball underneath the first one."

"Um… I think it's liquid," Kagura said uncertainly, giving it back to Osaka.

"No, no way!" Tomo scoffed, grabbing it out of Osaka's hand. "It's just a red ball underneath the blue one! I'll prove it!"

Kagura stayed where she was as Tomo rushed off, presumably to find something to cut open the ball. A few seconds later, Tomo ran by again, this time in the direction of the chain link fence that surrounded the field. Osaka followed her much more slowly, waving her arms as she trotted by.

For ten blessed seconds, there was silence. Then…

"AUUGH!" Tomo shrieked, backpedaling so fast that she almost fell over. "_IT'S ALL OVER ME!"_

"It's orange," Osaka said in wonder. "Who woulda thought?"

Tomo passed into Kagura's line of vision once again. The front of her gym shirt was covered in thick, orange goop, and as she neared Kagura, the hyper girl tried to wipe it away with her hands. This only served to smear it around and get it all over her hands. "Kagura, help me! It's sticking!"

Kagura sighed and shook her head in amazement. How she managed to get grouped together with those two was beyond her.

"Tomo, w_hat the hell is that_!" Yomi's voice snarled a few moments later.

"Get it off, get it off!" Tomo sobbed. "It's not coming off!"

"Okay, okay, just calm down! Let's go to the bathroom," Yomi said in as soothing a tone as she could manage. She shot Kagura a look that clearly said, '_Help me before I kill her._'

"It was liquid," Kagura heard Osaka say distantly as the athlete followed her friends to the bathroom.

"Oh… gross! It's staining the sink," Yomi was saying as she walked inside. "_No, don't do that! It's probably poisonous, you idiot_!"

"Am I going to die!" Tomo actually sounded a little excited at the prospect of being in mortal peril.

"You're not going to die," Kagura said, walking hesitantly to the sink, where Tomo was furiously scrubbing at her hands and arms, which were both stained orange. "I think. Geez, how did there get to be so much?"

"I don't know! I was just… and then… it was everywhere!" Tomo spluttered. "Get it off me!"

"Quit being such a baby," Yomi snapped, her patience worn thin. "This is your own damn fault, Tomo."

"No! It's Osaka's damn fault! She bought the stupid ball!" Tomo's lower lip stuck out. "I hate that stupid ball!"

"I think this is as clean as you're going to get," Kagura said, handing Tomo some paper towels. "But, um… you should probably change back into your uniform. Class is almost over. And your gym shirt is covered in… stuff."

"My hands are orange!"

Yomi was obviously fighting back laughter. "Um… they match your socks?"

--

"Wait, say that again. Where did Tomo, Yomi and Kagura go?" Minamo asked, trying not to lose patience with her easily distracted student.

"Oh…" Osaka closed her eyes in thought. "Tomo popped open a blue ball on the fence and got covered with the orange stuff inside, so they all went to the bathroom."

Minamo could only stare.

--


	5. Method Acting

_Ahaha, wtf, I'm updating this? I know, right? Uh, yeah. Consider this one a bit of a "what if?" If you know Azu-Dai canon (and why would you be reading this is you don't?) then you'll know that Tomo pretty much got into Yomi's high school because Yomi told her she couldn't. Or so Tomo claims, anyway. . . . Yeah._

_--_

The rapping on her window is as familiar—and annoying—as always. Yomi can't really call it 'knocking,' since for Tomo to learn to do something so conventionally polite as knock before entering a room is beyond what her simple mind can produce, and besides, it's not like she ever waits for an answer before coming inside, anyway. It's definitely more of a brisk, cursory tap, and then Tomo is sliding the window open and clambering inside.

"What do _you_ want?"

Tomo stretches and then flops over onto the bed, her hair fanning out underneath her. "What's this?" she asks, propping herself up on her elbows and ignoring Yomi's question completely. "_Homework? _We're on vacation, Yomi! I'm disappointed in you!"

"I have an early literature assignment due," she replies, voice even. "Every first year student is required to have it finished before the first day." _Not like _you _would know about it_, she doesn't add.

Doesn't have to. She can tell by the slow, too-casual glance Tomo shoots at the acceptance letter—it's been sitting on the desk for three weeks now—that she's hit a nerve, however lightly.

"You know," Tomo says, voice rising in that proud, aren't-I-awesome tone, "I could have gotten into that high school."

Yomi rolls her eyes. "Sure."

"If I'd wanted to."

"That's what you keep telling me, Tomo."

"Well, I could have. Who cares if I didn't get in? Who wants to go to that stupid school anyway?" Tomo smirks. It's infuriating, it's stupid, it's meant to piss Yomi off, but then again, Yomi can fight fire with fire along with the best of them.

"You know, Tomo, I hate to tell you this," she says lightly, "but I told you so."

Tomo shuts up for once, and Yomi stares down at her half-completed assignment, frowning despite herself, and in two weeks she will begin high school without Tomo, and she is _not _disappointed.


End file.
